BellaOnline Forums Money Online Auctions Ebay feedback dilemma

I bought a set of potholders that are the homemade kind. The auction said her 11 year old daughter made them and the picture looked like the kind I wanted.

My sister is about 40 and blind and has been making pot holders for years. I stopped speaking with my Mother several years ago am now down to the last two of my supply over the years since they used to line the boxes they sent for holidays with them.

The potholders arrived and they are child sized and no way could my hand even cover them to use them. They are NOT FUNCTIONAL. I feel ripped off. They cost 99 cents plus two bucks postage.

The issue here is that she should have stated these are for kids use only or for kid cake n bake stuff since no adult would be able to use these.

What do I do with them? I want to toss them as they are useless to me. I should just get a loom at Michael's and make my own. Been years since I did but should be kind of easy and probably good to do at night so my hands are not free to munch on food.

Anyway I am tempted to leave negative feedback. I forget now if they have neutral because that would be best. I want to put down that they were not accurately advertised and not functional.

What would you do, contact her first and give her the thoughts and see what she says?

I'm really disillusioned with Ebay these days! I've been selling and buying on there for years. As a seller I always leave feedback for the customer as soon as payment has cleared in my bank. However I notice as a buyer that there is a disturbing trend to sellers not leaving feedback until buyer has received the item and left positive feedback. So feedback from the seller becomes dependent on whether or not the buyer is happy with the goods instead of how they conducted the transaction.
I no longer use Ebay, choosing to use another auction site instead. Ebay doesn't have the customer service that it should have!
If I were you I would contact the seller and explain how you feel. Then if they are unreasonable or don't care, leave negative feedback, or neutral if you'd rather, along with the comment that the item was not described correctly!

Sikpiksie

I hear you on that one Sikpiksie!

When I sold, I left positive feedback for people as soon as they paid! Their obligation was done.

Right now, I am waiting for address labels (yes - I order them from ebay I do not make my own) and I have been waiting for 3 weeks. I just contacted the seller and asked if he had gotten the information to put on the labels. All he replied was- yes, he had received the info and would send them in the next couple of days.

When I bid on an auction - I am right there ready to pounce with my paypal payment immediately after the auction. Then I have to wait for them to ship the stuff.

I have a 100% rating now, and am not sure I care if it gets ruined as I will be honest about this address label person.

What site do you use?

Bonnie - I would contact that seller and see what they say......

I use Oztion. It's an Australian site.

I feel that it should be mandatory for the seller to leave feedback as soon as payment is received.

I too have had a number of transactions lately where I have had to contact the seller (3 weeks after I've paid) as to whether they have posted or not and got....I'll post in a couple of days!
The other one is the seller that only accepts bank deposit, doesn't have their details available on checkout and it takes them a week to get back to you with the details! Grrrrrr!!!!
The final straw for me came when I purchased an item, it didn't arrive, the seller lied through their teeth, saying they hadn't received payment, (even though it was paid via internet transfer and trackable) then when I told them I had tracked it and it went into their account 10 days prior, lied about posting it. I asked for the tracking number and was informed that they don't offer postage other than regular and too bad, too sad, my loss if it didn't arrive...even tho I paid for registered post!
I reported them but they're still selling and have 5 marks against them for failing to post!

There was a program on TV here a few nights ago about Ebay and how people are leaving in droves because of their bad customer service. It's a shame. I used to like ebay!

Sikpiksie

I am always very careful to look at sizing information when I buy - it's so easy to get misled about how big something is or what it contains. I would write them and tell them their auction was deceptive about the size, if the picture had no reference mark or size information. It definitely should have had that.

In terms of leaving feedback, actually I have to say that I agree with not leaving feedback as soon as payment is received. The feedback is about the entire transaction. I used to leave feedback immediately after I was paid. But then I would send the item out promptly and people would then get the item and complain about things which were clearly stated on the auction page to be a certain way. I would say "there is a scratch on the CD case but the CD itself is perfect" and then they would complain in their write-up that there was a scratch. Because I'd already left feedback, they felt they didn't even have to try to contact me or anything.

One person gave me a negative for getting a white cane even though I had 5 pictures of the cane being white and said it was white like 10 times in the description, title and listing. They didn't care because I had already given them a positive - what could I do in return?

So I very much think feedback should wait until BOTH people are happy, so that any disagreements are discussed and resolved.

Well, as both a seller and a buyer, I feel feedback should be left once payment is made, otherwise buyers won't leave true feedback about a seller. ie: if a seller takes forever to post or whatever, and some sellers refuse to discuss anything! As the last seller said 'too bad. So sad. Your loss'.
If the buyer leaves negative feedback you can reply to it so other buyers can see what happened.
Besides, someone has to leave first feedback.

Sikpiksie

The feedback should be left simultaneously, after the item has been received. When the person gets the item then there are emails which are sent back and forth about "yes I got it" and "what shape was it in" and "it is just the way described" and so on. After those final communications, then the transaction is fully complete, and the final feedback is left by both people as to that final status.

In terms of feedback on shipment length and everything, all of that has its own status field in eBay and is invisible to the seller. So the seller has no idea what the buyer said in terms of cost, shipping cost, shipping speed etc. So the buyer can say whatever they want to there and it wouldn't affect the shipper's feedback at all, since the shipper never sees any of that. The shipper only sees aggregate averages of that value, and only if there are over 5 entries I think.

Wow, it sounds like ebay has gone crazy. I think i would only be happy to buy there now, actually. It sounds like selling there has become a very catty scenario, with lots of nit picking and many back and forth emails.

I went to leave feedback on Ebay for a seller this morning, and a sign came up encouraging me to leave true and factual feedback for this seller without fear of repercussions, as sellers can no longer leave neutral or negative feedback for buyers.

What's that all about? Anyone know?

Sikpiksie

I left feedback the other day but it was positive and did see the other options.